NERC tells House panel the grid is on a knife-edge after Winter Storm Fern; urges faster permitting and transmission build-out

James Robb, president and CEO of the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, told the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee that while many reliability metrics held during Winter Storm Fern, the system's margin for error is shrinking and risk is rising.

Robb said NERC's latest long-term reliability assessment shows nearly two-thirds of the country are at elevated or high risk of energy shortfalls over the next five years, citing unprecedented demand growth, a changing resource mix and resource additions that are not keeping up with retirements. "We ran very close to the edge," he said, arguing the system left no room for error.

The testimony placed particular emphasis on planning and permitting: Robb urged federal, state and local reforms to accelerate siting and construction of both generation and transmission projects so resources move "out of the queue and into the ground." He recommended better coordination between the gas and electric sectors, saying the two systems are "two sides of the same coin" and that joint planning is needed because fuel availability now materially affects power-system reliability.

Why it matters: Robb and committee members warned that continued retirements of dispatchable, spinning generation without timely replacements or expanded transmission will reduce operators' ability to manage frequency, voltage and ramping needs during extreme weather. Robb said the system currently relies on many extraordinary operational measures and emergency orders to avoid outages, and that normalizing such measures is not sustainable.

What was proposed: Witnesses and members described a three-part approach to moving projects: planning to identify needs, paying (regional cost-allocation for multi-value transmission), and permitting reforms to accelerate construction. Robb said targeted interregional transfer capacity (on the order of tens of gigawatts in identified corridors) could materially reduce reliability risk and customer costs in extreme events.

Context and next steps: Members across the aisle broadly agreed on the need for new capacity and faster build timelines but differed on policy prescriptions: some urged more dispatchable fossil and nuclear capacity, while others pointed to renewables, storage and transmission as lower-cost hedges to fuel-price volatility. Robb asked Congress to consider statutory and administrative steps to cut permitting timelines and improve federal-state coordination. The subcommittee invited additional documents for the record and the hearing was adjourned without immediate votes.

The hearing is expected to generate follow-up written questions from members and sustain the committee's focus on transmission permitting and gas-electric coordination.